I’ve seen two shows recently (Netflix, HBO Max) that feature characters who are “birders.” I’d never heard that term before, only “birdwatchers.” Personally, I’d rather be a birder than a birdwatcher—“birdwatcher” infers, well, distant observer rather than embodiment.
As a kid, whenever someone asked which animal I would choose to be, I always said a bird. The thrill of flying, for one. Adventure, too. But mostly, it was the idea of that kind of freedom.
Those reasons still stand, but now if someone asks why I’d choose to be a bird, I’d say trust.
Birds trust. According to Jesus, they don’t have any kitchen cabinets. They don’t hoard. They’re maybe the first minimalists. Their tummies are full, not fat. They don’t seem to worry about tomorrow’s meal plan. They are present. They have faith. They trust. They are most likely people-watchers, and I wonder what they think of our machinations, our egos, our greed, our fear of falling.
I still wanna be a bird.
I not only want to fly like a bird—I want to eat like a bird.
Catbird by Mary Oliver
He picks his pond, and the soft thicket of his world.
He bids his lady come, and she does,
flirting with her tail.
He begins early, and makes up his song as he goes.
He does not enter a house at night, or when it rains.
He is not afraid of the wind, though he is cautious.
He watches the snake, that stripe of black fire,
until it flows away.
He watches the hawk with her sharpest shins, aloft
in the high tree.
He keeps his prayer under his tongue.
In his whole life he has never missed the rising of the sun.
He dislikes snow.
But a few raisins give him the greatest delight.
He sits in the forelock of the lilac, or he struts
in its shadow.
He is neither the rare plover or the brilliant bunting,
but as common as the grass.
His black cap gives him a jaunty look, for which
we humans have learned to tilt our caps, in envy.
When he is not singing, he is listening.
Neither have I ever seen him with his eyes closed.
Though he may be looking at nothing more than a cloud
it brings to his mind several dozen new remarks.
From one branch to another, or across the path,
he dazzles with flight.
Since I see him every morning, I have rewarded myself
the pleasure of thinking that he knows me.
Yet never once has he answered my nod.
He seems, in fact, to find in me a kind of humor,
I am so vast, uncertain and strange.
I am the one who comes and goes,
and who knows why.
Will I ever understand him?
Certainly he will never understand me, or the world
I come from.
For he will never sing for the kingdom of dollars.
For he will never grow pockets in his gray wings.
“Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them”. –Matthew 6:26